Astropolis Book1 : Saturn Returns - Sean Williams

The full title of this novel is Astropolis Book 1 : Saturn Returns (UK / US). Normally the words Book 1 are enough to make me run away from reading a novel. So the fact that the word Astropolis (the name for the series) is bigger than the words Saturn Returns on the front of the Orbit paperback edition was not necessarily a good omen. But the first few pages seemed interesting, and Sean Williams is one of those writers I've heard of but never read, and I was on holiday, so I dived in.

The story starts with someone waking up with no memory and not knowing where they are. It's not the most original idea, but it's handled nicely, as that person, Imre Bergamasc, is on a crazily remote spaceship run by a hive mind, and the way he got there is pretty unique.

Immediately the mix is apparent - space opera with cool (far)future tech. Just up my street. The main plot follows Imre Bergamasc as he tracks down his old crack team of soldiers, along with trying to figure out what in the galaxy is going on.

What enables the story to cover vast swathes of space and time is a clever and cool idea called Tempo. Enhanced humans can change the Tempo at which they experience time, meaning that they can slow down so that years pass like hours, or speed up - overclocking - so that seconds seem like minutes. It's used to great effect, from fight sequences, to explaining how humans travel vast distances, to explaining how huge overseeing intelligences think, to explaining the survival of Old-Timers. I think Large Canvas is the expression!

The other major idea used is that of multiple copies of a person being possible. These copies may be in separate parts of the galaxy, they may meet up and be absorbed, they may not. It leads to a lot of lovely twisty plot shenanigans, and also touches on the question of what makes a person - experience or DNA? Nature or nurture?

The plot has a good pace, chunks of action, plenty of enigmas and time for the characters to think. There are also some great sensawunda set-pieces. The writing style is pretty good, with the focus on the plot rather than flowery passages that I wanted to reread, in other words it does its job and stays out of the way. I read it quickly and enjoyed it a lot.

Except for one thing. You could have guessed this was coming. The ending. In an interview at the back of the book (which by the way, I'm loving that Orbit paperbacks now include interviews with authors at the back), Sean Williams says that he envisaged Astropolis as "three more or less independent books". For a while I thought that was going to hold up, but at the very end there were several threads that were not resolved to my satisfaction, and presumably will be in Book 2. What's even worse is that I really want to know what happens! Which means I'll have to read it. And then have to read Book 3.

Damn you, series! God damn you all to hell!!